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Bizarre tale of friends, guns and cars in North Vancouver suicide case

VANCOUVER — A man charged with helping his roommate kill himself became upset and wanted to call off the exchange of a BMW for a firearm when he saw that it was the wrong type of vehicle, a jury heard Monday.

Paul Adrian Fraser, 21, has pleaded not guilty to assisting the suicide of Robert Milot, 19, in North Vancouver in April.

The B.C. court heard Monday that prior to the fatal shooting, Milot had offered to give Fraser a BMW in exchange for the firearm.

Milot's friend Michael Murphy told the jury that when Fraser, whose nickname was Foley, saw that it was a BMW X3, an SUV, instead of a BMW M3, a sports car, he wanted to leave.

"Robbie begged him for the gun. He started hysterically crying," he said.

"Robbie said, 'Please Foley, take me out into the bushes somewhere. You know how to kill people. You can do this.' He was basically begging for someone to end his life."

In his opening statement, Crown counsel Phillip Sebellin told the jury that after the dispute over the car, Milot became upset when he discovered that Fraser had brought a shotgun, not a handgun, for the exchange.

"Mr. Milot said to Mr. Fraser, 'What can I do with this thing? I wanted the .357.' Mr. Fraser told Mr. Milot that the .357 was broken. Milot said, 'How am I supposed to do myself with this?'"

Sebellin said Fraser told Milot he could still "do it" with the shotgun, he just had to kneel down and point the gun at this head.

Milot knelt down on the ground and tried to point the gun at his head but Murphy objected and kicked the gun away, he said.

"Mr. Fraser then said, 'Don't do that until we're gone.' "

Fraser then hugged Milot and said to him, 'See you on the other side, I love you, man,' " said Sebellin.

"Mr. Milot said to both of them, 'I love you, too.' "

The next day, Milot killed himself with the shotgun near his sister's home in North Vancouver.

Jennifer Ferreira, Milot's sister told the jury that prior to the shooting, her brother had a warrant out for his arrest.

Her family decided that Milot would spend the Easter weekend at his sister's home and then turn himself into police, she said.

"He was upset, he was worried. He didn't want to go to jail. He didn't want to be a criminal."

Ferreira, a mother of a three-year-old girl, said she had leased a 2005 BMW X3 and noticed the vehicle keys were missing from her home on April 11, the day before the shooting.

She said she did not give her brother permission to drive or sell the vehicle and that her brother did not have a driver's licence.

Under cross-examination from defence lawyer Danny Markovitz, Ferreira admitted her brother was in trouble with the law and assumed it had to do with drugs and drug dealing.